


seven

by Thomas_Fooll



Series: Numbers (Joshler) [1]
Category: Twenty One Pilots
Genre: Bromance, Colors, M/M, Mindfuck, Seven Kings of Underground References, Songfic, Wizard of Oz References
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-16
Updated: 2019-05-16
Packaged: 2020-03-06 08:27:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,400
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18847321
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thomas_Fooll/pseuds/Thomas_Fooll
Summary: AU about the town without sun and colour.





	seven

**Author's Note:**

> This is a translation from Russian. You can read my original work at https://ficbook.net/readfic/5368229 if you will.
> 
> This is also a part of an finished series, that I'm planning to translate one day, however it might be an overestimation of my skills so- ugh- I don't know.
> 
> Songfic for: twenty one pilots - hometown (sleepers version recommended)
> 
> For the explanations of the parts, marked with '*'/'**' see the notes at the end.

Josh Dun has yellow hair and red beanies and also - white nail polish. Josh Dun has this crunchy soft skin reminiscent of sheets of rice paper soaked in black tea, smooth and dark, like he is not from their hometown.

 

Josh Dun smiles and bites his tongue, and his eyes narrow down - Tyler believes that laughing sincerely is the sign of a person who is truly happy. Josh Dun's hands are all covered with these tiny winter scars, and this is just how it goes sometimes, just coming and going, just healing by itself (no). From Tyler's perspective, Josh is the most unheard-of person he ever knew, like he's from some fairy-tale.

 

Like, Tyler has never ever known something like this, yeah, and.

 

Josh Dun is just a bit different, breathless people on the streets stare at him with these long and cold and mustardy-yellow like road markings stares of theirs.

 

Like, Tyler just loses his own breath and meaning.

 

| | |

 

Their hometown has seven Sources, but no light. In their hometown, like in this old novel about The Seven Kings of the Underground* \- there are the Lake of Oblivion and the Sleep Castles, and Tyler thinks of that as of something so shaky and transient that there is an overpowering urge to hold your breath and write into the void, to those other people that need to come to know him someday, something about all of them having made the same mistakes somewhere along the way.

 

The Lake of Oblivion is in the forest, where they all scream out of fear in the trees.

Tyler visits it when it's dark, so. Tyler visits it almost every waking hour he can.

 

Josh Dun has this smile with white teeth peeking out of his mouth and Josh Dun almost grandmotherly makes him a cup of chamomile tea and opens the window in his attic, facing the raininess of the day, getting his nose and cheeks wet as if that's how it should be.

 

"aren't you cold"

"aren't you dark"

 

Josh reminds Tyler of the duck mentioned in the poem of the unknown author that he bought on the book market.

 

~~not dark not dark not dark~~

 

That's much like his prayer, but a bit deeper. That's his motto, all his thoughts and ideas in a refined cube of words.

 

He sits down at the bank of the Lake of Oblivion and picks up a cone - the dry, plain one of a pine. The ones like this open their feathers up as a result of dehydration.

 

In the Lake of Oblivion there're someone's old shoes, books, frames filled with discoloured newspapers. Somewhere in these newspapers Tyler has once seen these stupid words about the minds filled with dirty thoughts and a wish to change oneself.

He noted then that no one ever writes that in the newspapers.

 

In the Lake of Oblivion there are his Objects of Passion. Drowned. Somewhere in there is his new basketball that was shamelessly ruptured by the tire of some stranger's car that Tyler has never seen before or after. Somewhere in there are the keys of his piano: a black one - F-sharp, and a white one - G-natural. Somewhere in there is his notebook with all of the sentences in two languages - English and French, well, because he used to do it like that when he was twelve or something.

 

The Lake of Oblivion is under this smoky sky of the most disgusting colour of them all, this cyan one, it's called Robin's egg blue, ~~HEX: #1FCECB~~ , but it's a such a foggy and unclean version of it, that when Tyler throws a coffee cup signed '-i_i' in the Lake, he suddenly desperately needs to wash his hands.

 

This damned Lake of Oblivion is going to be the death of him, to be honest.

 

"how do you make yourself sleep"

"how do you make yourself wake up"

 

Josh would definitely laugh at him, running through this damp grass to his Sleep Castle. Josh would say something about the vibe of it and also - about catching cold and having green snot and red throat.

 

Tyler would argue that, man, the throat is always red. That's the specifics, a concept - almost like this dark smoke coming out of the Objects of Passion, like this vicious perception and the stereotypes they create.

 

Archetype of the Sleep Castle is a white picket fence detached house. Automatic garage doors. Coffee-grinder sitting on a windowsill in the kichen.

 

Tyler runs up the stairs and pulls his coat off, because if Josh sees it he would want to say something about unsanitary conditions and ears covered with black.

 

Tyler would want to argue that his ears are always covered with black - smoky and a bit vicious. As all the organs of perception. That's a concept.

 

Tyler washes this horrible cyan off his hands, and here's his white skin again - like he's a cave boy, who has never seen the Sun.

 

No one knows him.

 

| | |

 

Tyler Joseph is just another freak among this gray mass of people. Tyler Joseph has a shaved head and unshaved chin covered with this teenager parody of a seven-o'clock shadow. Tyler Joseph is the definition of pale and pallid, as one should be in the place where there's no light.

 

Tyler Joseph gives names to all the locations he visits and tries to live with that, and Tyler Joseph tries to hang on Josh Dun with all of his limbs. Tyler Joseph smiles rarely and does so only when he drops another Object of Passion into the Lake of Oblivion or falls asleep in the Sleep Castle. Tyler believes that smiling like that is a sign of a person who is looking for something inside.

 

Like, in themself but on the outside, yeah, right.

 

Tyler Joseph stays unnoticed by the people in the streets and certainly no homeless puppies covered in mud follow him home.

 

Tyler Joseph is a wisp of smoke, and he tries his best not to lose it.

 

| | |

 

The fourth Source is the Ball Hall. Tyler goes there to dance and in the dark this action germinates an undeniable urge to spit out his guts, like he's poisoning his own hometown with his smoke.

 

The Ball Hall is surrounded by the pillars of pines, and on their trunk there are the Pillars of his existence, like:

 

"do you want to live"

"do you want to die"

 

And also something like:

'DoN'T FoRgeT To cHaNge YouR socKs UpoN coMiNg HoMe TYJo'

 

Tyler dances in this swamp mush, shaking his blowsy limbs and fucking the hell up his only jeans. In the dark there's no sign of this fucking Sun, and his hands are all pale, white almost, to the point where one of his nails painted with Josh's white polish blends with the skin.

 

As though Tyler is a ghost of his own existence.

Like his inexistent future and forgotten past, where everything is covered in cyan washes.

 

Tyler would come to Josh's Sleep Castle and would sing him songs about selling yellow curls of hair and Josh would smile silently, biting the sharp tongue of his, and Tyler's white hands will look absolutely horrible upon this dark brown wood of the ukulele, but Josh would paint them with the whitest of his paints and this will look beautiful.

 

Zinc white?

Titanium white?

 

In Josh's Sleep Castle it's always quiet and smells of cookies and milk, and there's always a cup of chamomile tea on the table and the attic door keys beside it - just in case Tyler suddenly identifies his reflection in the mirror.

 

And by the way the sky is always rainy.

Drips just right on his shaved head and his bare abdomen.

 

"do you want some tea"

"do you want to be me"

 

Tyler would invite Josh to the Ball Hall, because he would need to dance in this endless dark rain and somewhere in the dark Josh's nails, eyes-slits and smile will shine a fluorescent light and Tyler would want to sing songs that no one knows. Surrounding them these cyan-gray pillars of pines and Pillars of life will spin around, all covered with mustardy-yellow tar, and the sky would be full of nothing above it except for Josh's dreams of something that should be there, like in his favourite X-Files.

 

their conversations about everything mortal with no intonation and the habit to miss the last couple words in sentences

like there's something else hanging in between them, and it's different for each one of them

 

Tyler dances and thinks of his need to show these Northern People some colours apart from these horrible cyan of everything around them and mustardy-yellow of their stares.

 

Vermeil.

Ultramarine.

 

And also black, because there's too much white.

 

Tyler dances and wants the tears to cover his lips but there's only rain, and Josh stands here in the dark and silence, and hands-on-the-fabric-hands-on-the-skin-hands-on-the-belt, and Tyler forces Josh to dance along - that's, of course, not what you all might have thought. Tyler Joseph dances - and this generates ultramarine and black, and yellow, spilling out of Josh's hair that's not covered by beanie, drips right onto these blue puddles, creating a horrible cyan again.

 

The one that everyone knows.

 

| | |

 

If Tyler Joseph is the humanization of an endless winter, then he cuts open Josh's hands with a tiny knife in the night. Sits down and draws pictures in the raininess of it. Smells of chamomile tea and also of humid forest air. Blood smears over the tanned skin as those watercolour washes and tempera paint opaque strokes.

 

If Joshua Dun is the humanization of a short summer, then he has too much sunlight for their hometown. Sits down and draws pictures in his Sleep Castle, lit up by the bright lamp. Smells of milk, cookies and also of cigarettes. Lines spread around the washi paper as sketches of Tylers future tattoos that he wouldn't ever be able to afford.

| | |

 

The fifth Source, and it's important, is always closed from them. The Watchtower is always guarded by this old man - he must be over a hundred and ninety years old - that has been there since they were toddlers.

 

Tyler visits the Watchtower to understand.

 

It happens at night, and this Watchtower at the other end of his street seems so distant, that he feels a sudden urge to take his piano out in the street and play the night away with something simple but. The Watchtower in fact is really close, closer than anything Tyler has ever known.

 

It's like packing up and escaping to Cleveland in a school bus.

 

Everything is much easier than people tend to think, and every time the old man stares at him with that sad look of his, the one of a tired dog, and Tyler desperately wants to let his soul that's behind these eyes out - to show him something bigger than the infinite cyan glow of the Watchtower's guiding lights.

 

Satin washes on a piece of rice paper soaked in black tea.

White oil paint on the brown canvas.

 

And black, because there's already too much white.

 

In the Watchtower there's a note to his older self stuffed in between two bricks. In it there's something like: "I hope you won't disappoint me", and it's so childishly adult-like, that Tyler feels like finding it someday.

 

Josh in his Sleep Castle puts a kettle to boil and this means that he has eight minutes and thirty-eight seconds to come back.

 

Tyler wants to sing and that's what he is going to do now, hugging this dark brown ukulele in Josh's Sleep Castle, standing right on the other side of the street from his own - the one that smells of medicines prescribed to him and loneliness.

 

In their hometown all those Northern People see only these cyan, white and mustardy-yellow, and Tyler is sick of it, yeah, right.

 

"aren't you scared of moving your hands"

"aren't you scared of changing one's life"

 

Chamomile tea - it's white and yellow, too, - Josh brews it in a cyan teapot and then paints Tyler's hand upon the dark brown ukulele, and it looks as if Tyler's fingers were bleeding, covering the whole front deck with blood.

 

Vermeil, only a bit too realistic.

 

It's like sitting at a gas station in the middle of nowhere in the morning, waiting for someone to give you a lift home.

 

Tyler doesn't know what else to do to stop looking like a madman.

 

He needs some earth below his feet.

 

| | |

 

Then there are two places as one, and this one is for the two of them. The Boat and the Paddles - because everything means something.

 

Tyler visits the Boat in the early mornings, when the river is covered with fog.

 

The Sun isn't here.

And never will be.

 

The two of them are just no ones, and Josh, as always, is beside him, and his lips, cyan from the cold, taste like the gum from Target that he buys a whole box a time. Josh's hair is yellow, and his nails are white, and his beanie is red, and his hands are all covered with those winter scars, Tyler kisses every single one and says nothing with this lifeless voice of his.

 

The Paddles move around in the wind, and Josh once again tells him something about the wind over thirty-six knots, and gale, and, of course, catching the cold.

 

Tyler wants to argue that it's always a gale in here, because there's no other weather in this fucking hometown of theirs, sunless and colourless. And by the way Josh still has the chamomile tea with him and the Sleep Castle where they can always find a shelter, keeping each other away from the fever.

 

Zip open the soul, showing that there's something else apart from the outside world.

The Sun.

The vermeil Soul, the ultramarine Heart and the black Mind.

 

Tyler as Danko**.

Josh as a guiding star.

 

Like this, they are unknown in their sunless and colourless hometown.

 

In this lame novel about The Seven Kings of Underground with it's Lake of Oblivion, and the Ball Hall, and the Sleep Castles, and this Watchtower, and the old man with the eyes of a dog, and the Boat and the Paddles.

 

They are.

No ones.

**Author's Note:**

> * - The Seven Kings of Underground is a children novel by Russian novelist Alexander Volkov, one of a series of spin-offs of an adaptation of the Wisard of Oz by Volkov. The novel itself (in my opinion) is quite boring, so don't let the fact that there's no translation of it let you down. However, the story of the Kings themselves, prefacing the main plot, includes the Lake of Oblivion, Sleep Castles and many other peculiar things mentioned in this work.  
> ** - Danko is a fictional character of the Russian novelist Maxim Gorky, featured in a story of a series "Old Izergil". Unfortunately, there's no translation of the book. In his story, Danko becomes a leader of a group of people who have no light to come out of the dark forest they are trapped in. Following Danko, they try to get out of the forest. After some time, being blamed for undertaking the escape, Danko rips his chest apart, taking out his flaming heart to light the way.


End file.
